World Net Daily ... In an outrageous characterization of liberals versus conservatives, MSNBC commentator Joy Reid suggested the former need to "dumb down" the impeachment issue for the latter. By such a characterization, Reid makes clear she considers herself part of an elite liberal class that fully understands the issue. 

Sadly, yet another member of the media chooses to pull from her quiver of caustic arrows a barb rather than trying to promote a substantive dialogue concerning the impeachment issue.

But let us turn to another issue on which liberals and conservatives disagree, having clearly dug in their respective heels, resulting in a seemingly unending stalemate the likes of which have not been seen since World War I's trench warfare. Almost a quarter century ago, a very clear and simplified explanation, providing a graphic picture for all to understand the faulty reasoning underlying our immigration logic, was delivered. Its message is just as important today to understand.

The presentation was given by author Roy Beck who took a fairly dynamic approach to explaining the issue.

Beck begins his presentation with the statement, "Some people say mass immigration into the United States can help reduce world poverty. Is that true? Well, no it's not, and let me show you why."

Beck then starts his "gumball pitch," producing a single gumball and placing it into an empty cup to represent the 1 million immigrants the U.S. yearly has taken in on average since 1990. He notes while the vast majority of the world's poor are simply unable to take advantage of US immigration, we thus tend to allow in "the better off poor" from countries geographically closer to the U.S., who are able to take advantage (or disadvantage) of U.S. immigration laws.

Beck further explains, we look to do this "regardless of the effect on our unemployed, the working core, the most vulnerable members of our society, regardless of the effect on our natural resources. Even if we went by the most radical immigration proposals in Washington, which are actually double, to 2 million," dropping a second gumball into the cup, "which would totally overwhelm our physical, natural and social infrastructures, we couldn't make a noticeable difference."

The author then produces containers of various sizes, almost completely filled with gumballs, with each container representing the world's total impoverished population broken down by geographic continent. His justification for each million-person gumball is based on the World Bank's definition that those earning less than $2 a day qualify as such – a number totaling 5.6 billion people.

Beck goes on to explain how immigration to the U.S. of those 1 to 2 million immigrants fails even to put a dent into the 5.6 billion impoverished world population, as he takes one or two gumballs and drops them into the U.S. cup. In fact, he argues, it actually hurts any opportunity to improve life for the non-immigrating poor back home. 

Why? Because we lose sight of the fact those poor immigrating to the U.S. are among the "best and brightest" of the world's poor. They are the ones who, if they chose to remain in their own countries, would be helping to turn things around there. 

But, by immigrating they effectively drain an already impoverished nation of its most energetic, often better educated, certainly the most dissatisfied, of its people. Those immigrating to the U.S., effectively, are a host country's national asset lost – an asset making up its brain trust and entrepreneurial elite core that is needed to address the poverty issue within their own states.

The other point we tend to overlook is the World Bank's determination that the group of 5.6 billion impoverished people in the world grows exponentially by a factor completely erasing the minimal impact U.S. immigration has on their numbers. 

Beck tells us, "Immigration can never be an effective or significant way to deal with the suffering people of the world. They have to be helped where they live. 99.9% of them will never be able to immigrate to rich countries. There's no hope for that. … The only place that 99.9% of these people can be helped is where they live. Let's help them there."

Beck does a tremendous job helping listeners understand visually, by virtue of the colorful gumballs he moves around as he speaks, the reality of how failing to address world poverty at its source, not only denies other nations a tool for solving their own problem but overburdens our taxpayers' ability to help such immigrants here.

The bottom line on illegal immigration is this: 

...We decrease any chance of eradicating poverty for the world's collective impoverished populations at its source because we reduce their chances for improving conditions there by importing the very asset (the aforementioned brain trust) needed to assist in this effort – leaving home-bound impoverished populations that increase exponentially, far in excess of any offset achieved by accepting their immigrants here, while we overtax our own capabilities and citizens to help those relatively few (based on the total population of the world's poor) immigrants making America their home.

The explanation above fails to give Beck's informative presentation the justice it deserves. But the visual observation, seeing thousands of gumballs, representing billions of people, being moved around from container to cup, etc. makes it possible for the least-educated of us to understand the lack of positive impact U.S. immigration policy has on the billions of impoverished citizens of the world.

Following Reid's call for "dumbing down" issues, perhaps we should ask Beck to do an even more simplified version of his presentation for members of Congress!